We live in the age of the
televised war. War as shock and
shame has given way to war as entertainment and opining. Most
of the media gets high ratings for relatively little risk. Although journalists do still die in
"theater," gone are the days when the only way to get the story was to
accompany soldiers for days on end in the muddy
field, though these excursions were often more honest, less censored, and
ultimately, more influential.

"The
Israeli bombardment of Gaza continued today by sea and air. According to local
sources, one strike left a family of at least 10 - mostly women and children -
dead. Another struck a media building
and injured six journalists, raising concerns that journalists in Hamas-run
area are now targets."

"Reporters
Without Borders called the Israeli attacks "deliberate" and, in a statement
released Wednesday, stated that "journalists are entitled to the same
protection as civilians and should not be regarded as military targets.'"

Israel claims that
these journalists are biased towards the Gaza cause, though that does not
excuse destruction of media property and the killing of those who work
there. A more complete analysis
would have to include the reasons why
Gaza-based journalists are uniformly pro-Palestinian, but then again, Israel
can also claim that while Israeli territory allows for a wider range of
opinions, even some pro-Palestinian, in Gaza, pro-Israel or even unbiased journalists
risk their lives and can be accused of being CIA spies, a charge that can result
in a brutal death. According
to one recent National
Geographic reporter:

"Every
time a journalist comes here, (a tunnel worker) shouted, a tunnel is bombed.
How, he yelled, could he tell that we weren't spies? I'd noticed that when
Ayman tried to persuade tunnel operators to speak with me, the word "Mossad"
was often uttered. They presumed that if (camera operator) Paolo and I weren't
with the CIA, we must be with the Israeli spy agency. The tunnel worker's
paranoia is understandable, given that Israel's surveillance of Gaza is
constant, as the ceaseless buzz of drones overhead attested."

There are hundreds of
tunnels in Gaza and constructing them is both a vital lifeline and a major
source of employment for its citizens.

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Both sides of the recent
skirmish in the crowded
and teemingPalestinian-Gaza
territory have taken advantage of this confusion to engage in a propaganda
war, filled with misleading and even dishonest depictions that the too-trusting
mainstream media have been complicit in promoting. That media war now includes, on the Palestinian side, s pecifically: photos that have
been doctored (sometimes showing multiple
images of the same post-explosion "smoke plume"), set up (with incongruous elements
like children's stuffed toys lying in pristine condition amid piles of rubble,
for example, implying that children were in the area), false
attributions (sometimes deliberately) of Israeli attacks that turn out to
be "friendly fire" accidents from Hamas rockets, or staged attacks (with prone
figures imitating wounded or grieving victims, who then show up at other sites
weeks later, in seemingly the same condition, or who walk away right after the
photo shoot, unharmed).

The
man in the photo in this article's opening was filmed just a few minutes after this was taken,
walking around and apparently unhurt.
And yes, it does seem as though the militants in Gaza sometimes use
people as human shields
deliberately, as a tactic to inflame the West (it's working).

But,
if the Gaza media is so complicit and biased, and so easily proven to be so, what
is behind the Israeli strategy to bomb media centers too, beyond simple
demoralization and sowing confusion among Gaza residents? Why not allow
the Gaza media to embarrass itself with false stories, or are there other specific examples of Gaza media
reporting Israel is trying to suppress? This report from Russia Today
describes specific targeting of Gaza media sites and personnel: http://rt.com/news/gaza-media-center-strike-977/. A responding tweet by the IDF:

was nonsensical. Why would
the IDF target general media to prevent Gaza commanders from communicating with each other? That is
an entirely different set of channels, equipment, personnel, and purposes, etc. If they're not, than Israel needs to show more clearly how the media in Gaza is
directly aiding and abetting the enemy.

"But
other factors are worth considering. At a time when news outlets in the United
States are cutting foreign operations for monetary reasons, cheap and
ubiquitous technology has lowered the entry barrier for others who want to
engage in journalism, some of whom are already in the theater of conflict and
may have partisan motives. Many of those newer players are young and
inexperienced in ways that make them particularly vulnerable in the middle of
dangerous conflicts.

Other
journalists have close affiliations with partisan forces in these conflicts.